Seagate 7200.11, Es2 And Diamond Max 22 Firmware Failures The So Called Bricked Drives}

Seagate 7200.11, ES2 and DiamondMax 22 Firmware Failures The so called Bricked drives

by

chris09

A widespread firmware problem has recently been causing ever increasing numbers of hard drives to become terminally inoperable on power up. This issue affects the following drive series: (for list of specific model numbers affected, see end of report):

Seagate 7200.11

Seagate ES2

Maxtor DiamondMax 22

The problem affects drives with capacities of 500Gb, 750Gb, 1Tb or 1.5Tb. Drives that suffer this failure either hang in a busy state, have their total capacity detected as 0 LBA or may report a SMART failure.

The fault stems from a firmware issue that set an invalid boundary value for the drives circular event log. Where this coincides with a particular test pattern being placed in the system tracks of the reserved area by some of Seagates post manufacture tester applications, the event log pointer is incremented beyond its allowable boundary. This is detected as an Assert Failure by the drive which freezes as a self-protection response. Once this occurs the drive is remains inoperable however many times it is subsequently powered up. The unpredictable nature of the problem means that it is near impossible to say whether or when drives with the firmware in question will fail.

The initial response from Seagate was to play down the likelihood of drives failing and to offer a firmware upgrade or patch to remove the possibility of them doing so. However this was of little comfort to those whose drives were rendered little more than paperweights. Other reports suggest that installing the firmware upgrade may give rise to other, previously unseen firmware problems, and users should be also be aware that the upgrade is designed merely to repair the drive but, will in the process, erase all user data stored on it.

Seagates offer of support to those with drives affected by this issue, only extends to those with retail drives, anyone with an OEM drive that came as part of a system, will have to approach the supplier of their system. Furthermore, not all suppliers seem as yet to be geared up to provide effective solutions. Specific instances of such OEM drives include Seagate drives installed within Hewlett Packard (HP) systems. These have additional HP labelling on the drives themselves and also have subtly different firmware versions installed, that require different remedial actions to rectify the problem.

Working with our Data Recovery: partners, Data Clinic have devised methods to resuscitate the affected drives, allowing complete recovery of users valuable data from them. The applications and procedures that Data Clinic have been able to bring to bear on the problem have achieved recoveries on all the various versions that have been received to date.

The applications Data Clinic support, with the unique training and technical support they can offer , mean that this problem offers a unique opportunity for our partners, or those considering partnership, to market a proven solution to their clients.

For more details on partnership with Data Clinic, or recovering data from these drives, contact us.

Drive Model Numbers Affected: (those so far reported, other models may prove to be at risk)

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11: ST31000340AS, ST3750330AS, ST3640330AS, ST3500320AS, ST31500341AS, ST31000333AS, ST3640323AS, ST3640623AS, ST3320613AS, ST3320813AS, ST3160813AS

Seagate Barracuda ES.2: ST31000340NS, ST3750330NS, ST3500320NS, ST3250310NS

Maxtor DiamonMax 22: STM3500320AS, STM3750330AS, STM31000340AS, STM31000334AS, STM3640323AS, STM3320614AS, STM3160813AS.

Chris Sally manage the whole operations of Data Clinic. For more information on

Hard disk drive failure

Visit http://www.dataclinic.co.uk

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Seagate 7200.11, ES2 and DiamondMax 22 Firmware Failures The so called Bricked drives
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